I don't think it is a matter of denial but we observe conflicts within the community of ‘scientific literature’. It used to be that if it is scientifically proven than it must be true, not anymore these days. What and whom should we trust? The ones that get most media attention?
I don’t think much has changed on the science front. The people to believe remain those that are reviewed by their peers as working the right scientific way.
There is still the same process of natural selection of models to fit an experimental situation. At first various hypothesis are on the table. Then data are collected, hypothesis are tested, some are refuted, some survive.
This never totally back or white.
As far as global warming goes, we are clearly at a stage where the hypothesis “man has major impact on climate change” is accepted by the vast majority of credible scientists.
Per the article I linked to, what differs is the attention given by the media to other hypothesis that are not the preferred one as an output of the scientific process of convergence described above. Some content that is not accepted by the scientific community as being credible is passed down to people by some media without the required editorial comments. This conveys the false impression of a continuing debate.
Why is this the case? My guess is that this is a very touchy topic with broad potential economic impacts that is hitting some very powerful lobbies (the energy/oil one for instance). It is also touching people because some feel their luxury way of life could be under threat. Finally the US under Trump leadership has decided not to respect their engagement in the Paris treaty, which makes it the only large climato sceptic country in world.
So some media outlets are clearly corrupted into conveying messages opposing the scientific consensus to serve the interests of the said lobbies and/or of the Trump administration (Fox news comes to mind). Other are probably just saying what they think their readers want to read.
Cheers,
Bernard